My Salvation
by PsychoSushi
Summary: Kenshin finds salvation in Kaoru after having nightmares of Tomoe


A/N: Hello everybody, I'm back.. Exams are over and this is my newest fic My Salvation. The first chapter is based on Linkin Park's Easier to Run. This is K/T in the beginning but the end is K/K, so all you Tomoe haters bare with me (K/T is my second favourite pairing). Please review.  
  
Disclaimer: Mua haha I own RK and the whole wide world. Be mine Kenshin!!! Mua haha!!! # jumps up and down the bed # Translation: # Sigh # I do not own Kenshin # bows down in defeat #  
  
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It's easier to run  
  
Replacing this pain with something numb  
  
It's so much easier to go  
  
Than face all this pain here all alone  
  
It was a beautiful morning in Tokyo. The birds and crickets were singing a beautiful song in rejoice of summer. The golden morning sun was shining brightly in the blue, blue sky. The trees were swaying to the gentle rhythm of the wind. A perfect morning!  
  
Battle cries, the clashing of bokkens and insults could be heard from within the walls of the Kamiya Dojo signifying a normal start of the day. I was busy completing my daily chore of washing clothes. For some it might seem degrading for a the most feared assassin in Japan to go as low as doing a woman's work but for me it was a time to think and reflect upon the past.  
  
But today I was feeling particularly melancholic and sentimental.  
  
"It's been a long time," I thought as I bent down over the washing tub to scrub a shirt against the washboard. Bubbles and foam were flying everywhere because of the slow summer wind and the vigorous scrubbing.  
  
"Tomoe, it's already been 12 years. How time passes." I stopped scrubbing and lifted my head into the infinite blue sky. I closed my eyes and let the gentle breeze caress my skin. My mind wandered back to that day 12 years ago.  
  
Something has been taken  
  
From deep inside of me  
  
A secret I've kept locked away  
  
No one can ever see  
  
Your blood as everywhere staining the snow and my heart with your blood. I held on to your weak body, begging you not to leave, praying to the Gods that they wouldn't take you. But they took you anyway, leaving me to suffer the pain alone.  
  
Wounds so deep they never show  
  
They never go away  
  
But before you left you gave me something, something for the little sanity left in me to hold on to. You left a scar on my left cheek, an eternal mark. Your last gift, a remembrance, with me forever till death.  
  
Like moving pictures in my head  
  
For years and years they've played  
  
I awoke from my reverie, fresh with memories of your departure. Full of pain. I smacked myself mentally " It's been a long time. It's silly of me to think about it." Or was it.  
  
Fiery red bangs shadowed my sad violet eyes. Your memory has always been with me. Every time I close my, I would see your death replaying over and over again, your blood everywhere. Haunting my dreams forever.  
  
If I change I would  
  
Take back the pain I would  
  
Retrace every wrong move that I made I would  
  
If I could  
  
Stand up and take the blame I would  
  
If I could take all the shame to the grave  
  
I would  
  
"I'm sorry," I muttered. It was my entire fault. If I had never killed Kiyosato, if I never became a hitokiri.you would be safe and contented. If I were given another chance, another opportunity, I would change everything.  
  
Sometimes I remember  
  
The darkness of my past  
  
Suddenly, I saw you standing in front of me, beckoning me to you with a frail white hand. My eyes widened in horror. It couldn't be, I thought you were gone.  
  
"Tomoe," I whispered as I tried to reach for you, to feel you in my arms again.  
  
In a blink of an eye, you were gone. Disappearing like the wind under the sunny blue sky.  
  
I was left in shock. This was the first time you appeared out side my dreams. Maybe I was hallucinating, yes, you were a mirage, a trick of light. I should take a rest, a good nap perhaps before I start seeing things again.  
  
That was the decision. I got up, wiped my hands off the soap and left the laundry unfinished. I quickly walk towards my room, hoping to get the sanctuary I needed so badly.  
  
Finally I reached my room, I opened the door and was greeted by darkness. This place was always dark, no matter day or night. I seem to like it that way, as it helps me keep in touch with my darker side. I know that no matter how hard I try to change to change, I will always be the Hitokiri Battousai.  
  
I seated my self against a wall. I closed my eyes trying to find peace. But instead I remembered the sins I committed during the Bakamatsu no Douran, the cries of warriors I killed. Faceless shadows of these brave men trying to tear me apart as I did to them.  
  
Bringing back these memories  
  
I wish I didn't have  
  
I was standing in a desert, a desert of bones. Heaps and heaps of human bones stretched towards the horizon. The smell of rotting flesh lingered in the air.the scent of death. This atmosphere reminded me so much of someone.myself.  
  
Then, I saw you with your back facing me, walking away from me in delicate, graceful steps. "Tomoe!" I called out towards you. "Tomoe! What are you doing here?" wanting to know why such a pure creature like you would be doing in such a vile place like this.  
  
You stopped dead on your tracks as if acknowledging my calls. I rushed up towards you and placed my hand on your shoulders.  
  
"Tomoe-" that was when you turned to greet me with a horrible sight. Skin was peeling off your face revealing the muscles and bone beneath it. Your eyes, without pupils, were staring at me with wickedness in them. You smiled showing your yellow-stained teeth with rotting flesh stuck between it.  
  
I stared in horror, where was the beautiful Tomoe I always remembered. Why were you in the form of an ugly monster, the image of Death? Is it because you had to pay for my sins? Why? Why?  
  
"TOMOE.!"  
  
Sometimes I think of letting go  
  
And never looking back  
  
And never moving forward so  
  
There would never be a past  
  
I awoke from my nightmare drenched in sweat and panting heavily. "It was only a nightmare, only a nightmare," I assured myself, "It won't happen again."  
  
"It won't happen again." Somehow I doubt what I had told myself would ever come true. These dreams were to be my companions for the rest of my life. Chasing away my hopes of ever sleeping peacefully.  
  
I leaned back against the wall and let my bags cover my eyes. "Why? Why can't they leave me alone? Why can't I, for once, find solace in my dreams?" I asked myself hoping someone would answer those thoughts.  
  
"If you end it right here, right now. They would leave you alone, forever," replied a small voice from the back of my head.  
  
"Really? Would they?"  
  
"Yes, I promise you."  
  
My head turned towards my sword, which was propped next to me against the wall, like I was in a daze. Yes, with one slice, I could end it all, end my miserable life to join you, my first love. I reached for the sword and unsheathed, a reverse-edged sword, never stained with blood at all.  
  
I admired the gleam of the deadly weapon with the little light that was penetrating my room. It was very hypnotic, willing me to take my own life, a desire that I readily succumbed to.  
  
I positioned the sharp edge of my sword under my chin, readying myself for the moment of deliverance. But I hesitated for a minute. "They will leave you alone forever," those words rang throughout my head.  
  
I had made up my mind, it was now or never. I clenched my eyes shut and slightly pressed the cold hard blade into my Adam's apple, pressing harder and harder inside with every passing second. Blood trickled down my throat from small droplets into streams of red.  
  
It was then that I felt it was enough. I released the sword from my tight grip and let it fall on to my lap. I looked at the pool of blood surrounding me, all there was left to do now was await death to come.  
  
Suddenly, I could vaguely make out some footsteps from the outside. It was light, indicating a person of small stature, but so full of fury. Maybe it was Death himself coming to claim my soul, what an honour.  
  
The door flung open and the light from outside temporarily blinded me. I squinted my eyes to make out the shape of a young nubile maiden.  
  
It was her! The landlady of the house I live in, the ray of light which reached into the lonely depths of my heart after you, Tomoe. My sapphire- eyed raven-hair girl.  
  
She stormed into the room, face flushed with anger. "Mou Kenshin! You were supposed to-," she burst out angrily, before gasping in horror at the sight of the blood. "Oh my God, Kenshin!" she exclaimed while rushing to my side.  
  
She sat down next to me. She examined the source of the blood by brushing her fingertips against my wound with caution, afraid it would hurt me. I hissed in pain from the burning sensation and she quickly withdrew her hand. I saw tears brimming out of my angel's beautiful eyes, a sight that wrenched my heart.  
  
She tore a piece of cloth from her pink kimono and pressed it against my neck wound like a compress. I cringed at the pain but made no attempt to push her away. "Kenshin no baka," she sobbed to herself. Crystal clear tears were rolling down her pale porcelain cheeks, "What were you thinking?"  
  
Those words hit me like a strike of lightning, "What was I thinking?" I was stupid. Didn't I promise Tomoe to live on. Maybe I was a baka.  
  
Just washing it aside  
  
All of the helplessness inside  
  
Pretending I don't feel misplace  
  
Is so much simpler than change  
  
I looked down at my angel, Kaoru. Once again she saved me from the darkness that threatened to overwhelm me.  
  
She was busy tending to that nasty gash to my neck, which seem to be a futile attempt because it wouldn't stop bleeding. A smile tugged at my lips. She looked so innocent and naïve from my view with her sleek black hair cascading down her shoulders.  
  
I kept on admiring her for a few silent minutes until concern blue eyes gaze worriedly into my amethyst ones. "It's too deep, Kenshin. I've got to get Megumi. Please, can I, can I trust you not to hurt yourself anymore," she quivered, trying to control herself from bursting into tears.  
  
I nodded slightly as the pain on my neck was getting into me. She placed my hand on the compress to secure it from falling before running off frantically to get Megumi, our doctor. She left the door open, bathing my room in the morning rays.  
  
It's easier to run  
  
Replacing this pain with something numb  
  
It's so much easier to go  
  
Than face all this pain here all alone  
  
I looked out of the door that Kaoru left open. I saw you again, this time all beautiful and smiling too.  
  
"Thank you again," I whispered. You smile broadly with happy, kind eyes and dissapeared with the wind that blew right trough the door. I promise that I would live on, as long as I can for Kaoru and you. As long as I can.  
  
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A/N: Think I deserve an award, think I write like a kindergartner, please review to tell me what you think of this fic. Tell me if you would prefer this fic as a one-shot or would you like me to update. It's all up to you (well maybe not entirely, might depend on my mood). Thanks for reading! 


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